Celtic Christian Studies Library

The Community’s Celtic Christian Studies Library is housed at Lindisfarne Retreat, between the Post Office and the Lindisfarne Gospels Garden on Holy Island, UK. It aims to stock every serious work in English on Celtic Christianity, and some significant books on each of the Ten Marks of the Community’s Way of Life, including spiritual formation, soul friendship and healing the land. It is available to members, guests and pilgrims who arrange this, and has an on-line facility.

It is normally open 10.00 am to 6.00 pm Monday to Saturday

Library Project Manager Karen Stahl, of USA, writes:

• ‘The process of creating a library catalogue involves online from the holdings in one or more libraries from all over the world, entering their computer information into the local catalogue, then “tweaking” it to reflect the specific item at hand. It involves organizing the database according to 64 categories
• Why all this work, time, energy and fuss? For Judith and me, who are school and parish librarians at home, the process grows out of a deep love for books and for reading. But more importantly, all this effort is a means to an end. The end is not books organized logically on a shelf or labels perfectly centered on the spines. The end --- the goal – the purpose --- of all this is use. The vision is that this special collection of Celtic resources and ministry materials will be used, and user-friendly. Patrons will hopefully come, browse, search the computer for a favourite author or title, be able to print out a list of all the items highlighting their desired subject, easily find the resources on the shelves, spend time reading, or writing, or praying, and go away changed. Judith Line hopes to be able to spend more and more time in the library as the resource librarian, assisting students, pastors, pilgrims, and guests to discover the rich legacy of Celtic spirituality and history in print that Ray has so lovingly assembled.
• As Project Manager, I have a vision --- that once the library has been completely catalogued and organized (hopefully by early 2009), people for whom these resources are part of God’s holy curriculum for their lives will be drawn to Holy Island, to this little cottage with its hidden treasures, and will find just what they are needing for their understanding of Celtic spirituality, their scholarship, and their own personal growth. Who knows the lifelong learning, the creativity, the ideas, the healing, and the eventual nourishing, intellectual feasts that may come out of this literary ”kitchen” on Holy Island?’

Updated 20-01-2011